Innovation from Teijin offers recycled fibre breakthrough
Fibre manufacturer Teijin has developed technology to mass produce a new version of its Nanofront ultra-fine polyester. The Japanese company has described Nanofront as the world’s first nanofibre to be made from recycled polyester raw materials.
It also said that the new technology it has developed will enable it to produce all of its polyester fibre products with recycled raw materials.
Teijin expects textiles made from this new version of Nanofront using recycled polyester materials to replace conventional Nanofront made from virgin raw materials in a wide range of fields, including sportswear, functional clothing, industrial uniforms and more.
Its analysis suggests that its sales of the recycled version of Nanofront will increase from $2.75 million in 2021 to $7.5 million in 2025.
Demand for recycling raw materials is rapidly increasing, it said, but it has been difficult to mass produce ultra-fine fibres made from recycled polyester owing to the need for high-level polymer control and spinning.
Its technology breakthrough is the development of new techniques for polymer-control and spinning techniques. It explained that the key was a proprietary composite-fibre processing technology it has called “sea-island”. This involves distributing two types of polymers into the fibre’s ‘sea’ and ‘island’ or ‘matrix and ‘fibrils’ parts, dissolving and removing the ‘sea’ part using an alkaline treatment and extracting only the ‘island’ part as raw yarn.
Image shows a sample sock made from the new, recycled version of the Nanofront fibre.
